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I have no knowledge, that Mari Hole will leave the team: where this information comes from?

She was deleted from Stuttgart's roster on VBL site also for current season and there was no mention of her at all in any article from Stuttgart, so I assumed she wouldn't return next season...

I think, this is a misunderstanding: when it became clear, that Mari couldn't play in season 15/16 anymore due to her shoulder injury, and after finishing the European Cups with their bigger demand of number of players, she was no longer listed as available consequently, for example to recycle her number for another player (Alexandra Bura from the second team). But the option for season 16/17 of Allianz MTV Stutgart still exists, she accompanied the team until the very last game on 2. May 2016 in Dresden and the negotiations about player contracts are largely not finished. So it is open IMHO currently, if the option is taken or another outside hitter is engaged for the last open position (three are already fixed).

By the way, I'm not sure even with Köpenick, if they manage to survive economically. The silence from there is rather suspicious and in the last years they had often a hard time to get the money required to stay in the first league. Although they succeeded since 2005 every year with it, this means nothing due to the increased prerequisites by the VBL.

Rote Raben Vilsbiburg takes one of the open berths, after VC Wiesbaden and USC Münster didn't announce participation: the surprise is, that they go also directly into CEV Cup, not into Challenge Cup like last year, when situation was similar for them.

And the last surprise is: Schweriner SC went down, takes part into Challenge Cup instead of CEV Cup: calculate they better chances in this lower grade competition?